So, this is what I’ve learned from participating in Heidi’s Iron Chef-blogstyle carnival:

-BOY, do I ever need new kitchen equipment. *Seriously*

-I can COOK! No, really! I’ve been enjoying this a LOT! (get up off of the floor, Mom, I’m not lying :) ) And I’m not bad at it at all!

-There are more spices out there than just salt, pepper, and chopped onion. Ummm, does chopped onion count as a spice? That’s the Lazy Cook’s onion secret for when a recipe calls for CHOPPED onion. {ahem} I only wish I was kidding….

-I need to clean my oven. Heh. Yeah.

-Kids LOVE to cook! And more importantly, I really enjoy doing it with them. It’s one of those mindless activities that kids (translation: ESPECIALLY TEENAGERS) will open up and really talk while they are doing it. Kind of like talking while you are driving somewhere, no one’s looking at each other, guards’ are down…honest talking happens. ;) All parents of teenagers can thank me for that tidbit.

-Sadly, on that note, when the kids make brownies, they turn out like this (I say sadly, because my Inner Baker has died):

The kids actually made those! The recipe was from Heidi and it was HOMEMADE and simply the.BEST.EVER.

Which brings me to my next point:

-I can make HOMEMADE food from actual RECIPES. The Family joke of “If it doesn’t come from a BOX or CAN, it didn’t come from Dana’s Kitchen”…NO LONGER APPLIES! I can do it all.by.myself!

(a silent tear of sheer pride is rolling down my Mom’s cheek at this moment. I LOVE YOU, MOM! You knew I could do it…)

And my last point, and on a tragic note:

-I seriously need to stock my kitchen with COOKING stuff. I have no blender. My crockpot met a terrible end after being dropped well over a year ago. I have 3 cooking spoons, 2 spatulas that are both broken at the handle, and 1 strainer that strains much more than just water. I have no George Foreman grill. Zero whisks. And no toaster oven. But I have a microwave that could probably fit a small car inside.

I know, I liked that microwave part too. :DJesus, bless the microwave-maker, please…

So, in honor of Heidi, because she has taught me so much, NEXT month, I want everyone to check out her blog, check out the recipes, and try them out.

RAISE A GOOEY-BROWNIE IN HONOR OF HEIDI!

{cue applause}

Thank you, Heidi. On behalf of all horrible cooks out there, WE SALUTE YOU!

Brooklyn even gave it a go, but nothing happened. HAHAHAHA So I had to open all the cans and they dumped it all in. I’m all about opening cans and dumping stuff together, I can cook like that!

Yeah….my daughter’s her own personal tattoo artist. Sucks. OYE! Just look at the cool food….

Now, I do not have a crockpot anymore. Tragic accident of meeting my ceramic tile in the kitchen….tile survived….crockpot didn’t. I miss that crockpot…so, I had to use a pot on the stove to cook mine. It worked just fine, I just let it cook on low for about 30 minutes and that just had to work.

My take on it: I have to say, I was REALLY skeptical of RANCH dressing going in it, but it was YUMM-O for sure! In fact, I make taco soup all the time and will definitely be using this recipe. It was GREAT! Not sure how kid-friendly it was since I had to brown the meat, and open the cans, but they can sure dump!

Directions:
Separate corn bread twists; wrap one strip around each hot dog. Brush with butter; sprinkle with Parmesan cheese, Place on a lightly greased baking sheet. Bake at 375° for 11-13 minutes or until golden brown. Yield: 8 servings.

I know…you wanna just dive on in there and bite that baby don’tcha? All that flaky yummy…

OK, this picture is HIL*ARIOUS! Look at that poor face….is she NOT the saddest thing you’ve ever SEEN?!? She was CONVINCED that I did NOT give her the hotdog that SHE personally made. LOL OK, granted, it’s probably not, but I had 4 kids helping me make these bad boys….

They went over REALLY well, I have younger kiddos eating these and I’m a FREAK about choking hazard-stuff, so I sliced the hotdogs lengthwise. For the younger ones, I usually slice them lengthwise, then turn them and slice them lengthwise AGAIN, but that’s just not probable with this recipe. LOL The OTHER adjustment I had to make, I could NOT find for the life of me the corn meal stuff, so I just had to go with what WalMart had. I think I used croissant stuff. It was GOOD!

I know you’ve been waiting on the EDGE OF YOUR SEATS for more recipes from Heidi’s fun blog…you all know how DEARLY I love to cook, and the enjoyment…pleasure…..{cough cough} ahem….OK, yeah, I don’t, but this is KIDS cooking. Important feature. SLAVE labor…..THAT I like. So on to Recipe #2 that we tried.

Pepperoni Pizza Grilled Cheese Sandwiches with Fruit Salad from a personal friend of mine I’ve known for a few years. This will not give her any favors. ;) Stacy is a DOLL, a sweet, sweet lady with beautiful kids, I’m honored to know her. But I am impartial in my judging of food. Sad truth about me. Now you know.

Ingredients:
Bread, two slices
Butter
Pepperoni
Chedder cheese (or whatever cheese you like) I used cheap-o sliced cheese for the kids and cheddar and mozzarella for the Big kids.
Marinara sauce I used Ragu’s Pizza sauce because it doesn’t get the bread all soggy. I don’t like soggy bread. Yuck.

(I’m all about simple recipes with simple ingredients.)

I divided up the bread to be buttered so my boys would not argue over one having to butter more bread than the other. I’m also, all about saving myself from the possibility of senseless arguments. Can I also just add, I’m so glad this was for KIDS to make because I seriously hate to make grilled cheese….all that buttering of bread….just gives me the shivers. Heh.

After they buttered their bread, they slapped them on the griddle (only piece of really cool cooking equipment I have. Yes, I know…truly, deeply sad.). I love that griddle….capable of cooking up to 6 of those puppies at one time. While they were on the griddle, they spooned on the sauce and put on the pepperoni and cheese. They each had their turn of making 6. Again, no fighting. ;)

Look at that yummy….

The kids enjoyed them! WARNING: sauce and insides will be HOT. Please make sure they are cooled down before serving them to unsuspecting children. ahem. Not that I would do that. Pshaw….really now, I’m a trained professional….

Burned taste buds did NOT keep him from scarfing the entire thing down and having more either.

Well, I was going to post this for Heidi’s Iron Chef challenge, but, well….I just can’t do it the way I wanted.

I was gonna take pictures like I normally do of the preparing the recipe, but, well, I just can’t.

I’m leaving Monday for a week of Youth camp with church and I just can’t seem to get everything done. I’m packing, cleaning, shopping, shopping again for the stuff I forgot the first and second times shopping, and trying to make sure Austin has more stuff packed then just his basketball shoes. Faithweek is more than just basketball……I’m just sayin.

So anyway, here is my just plain-jane recipe. And honestly, I’ve never made it. Sad, huh? But Heidi’s Iron chef challenge is making me become INTERESTED in actually cooking, so I picked a recipe I’d really LOVE to try. And I really AM going to make this because I seriously am in LOVE with Guacamole. I heart it. And it’s labeled as a SALAD! Who knew! Probably the makers of guacamole….but it’s not just a dip, but a salad. OK, I’ll just shut up now and post the recipe…

DIRECTIONS
Peel and mash avocados in a medium serving bowl. Stir in onion, garlic, tomato, lime juice, salt and pepper. Season with remaining lime juice and salt and pepper to taste. Chill for half an hour to blend flavors.

So thank you, Heid for challenging us to COOK! Heh. My family thanks you. ;)

4-8 large russet potatoes
6-10 boiled eggs
sweet relish (you can use dill-if you like it better)
mustard
mayo or miracle whip
salt, pepper, garlic salt, season salt or paprika

Directions (some are hers, some are mine…..with a healthy dose of humor and photos):

Dice the darn potatoes. (I still hate dicing…probably even MORE now that I’ve done so much of it these last 2 weeks. ;) )

Again, I detest peeling too, so I didn’t. Recipe didn’t say one way or the other, and of course, I’ll take the lazy way out.

To save time I never seem to have, I boiled the potatoes and the eggs at the same time.

Boil and bubble, toil and trouble….

Wait….nevermind….

But SPEAKING of bubbles, that reminds me! We interrupt this Iron Chef-blogstyle post to bring you a commercial break:

I have discovered this cleaner and LOVE it! I seriously HEART this stuff! It actually encourages me to CLEAN because I LOVE the smell of it! It actually calms me. And with 8 kids running around the house at any given time, I need that. Mr. Clean with Febreze Lavendar and Comfort…..one of my favorite things right now.*

OK, back to the blog:

After you boil the potatoes and the eggs, you need to rinse them in COLD water, like so:

Sprinkle a generous about of salt and pepper, about half that amount of garlic and seasoned salt.

OK, watch this….

Oh look….the Potato Washer is back! She bailed on me at the beginning of this recipe…..anyway….did you catch what I did in that photo? I added a full TEASPOON of garlic powder in there!

I KNOW!! Oh MY! That was bad….really really bad….

Right after this photo was taken, I noticed my HORRID mistake and had to rinse the potatoes again.

heh. This is why I hate cooking….

So add the seasonings again because I’m a dork and did it WRONG.

Then you add the mayo:

Try to convince the Potato Washer that it’s MAYO, NOT ice cream…

No, SERIOUSLY…that’s not ice cream…

She listens like her dad….wish I’d gotten a picture of her face after she tasted it and realized Mom was right…. ;)

Shell the eggs….or de-shell….just PEEL maybe? Whatever, take the crap off the outside of the egg, and mash the eggs:

Lose 1/4 of the eggs to the Potato Washer. Nice….

Then you generously squirt mustard until the color becomes radio-active.

Cover and place in refrigerator for as long as possible. Over night is best, but I tend to not be ahead of the game and sometimes only get 1 hour.

I served it with Shake-n-Bake chicken tenders and corn.

Yes, that is a MIGHTY lot of yellow there….even down to my Grandmother’s GORGEOUS yellow dishes I inherited. Hush, it was supposed to be steamed BROCCOLI to go with it, but I forgot and served the broccoli to the daycare kids with their lunch since obviously we couldn’t have corn. So the end result is a lot of yellow.

Whatever.

I made Potato Salad for the FIRST time in my LIFE! Seriously!

Now, I am not a fan of potato salad. I know, sad, huh? Now PASTA salad I’d be ALL over…..however, how would it look for an Iron Chef recipe that is supposed to consist of POTATOES, be made with pasta instead?

So the recipe didn’t get high marks from ME only because I don’t like potato salad. However, my dear, darling Husband really liked it and my teenage son LOVED it! Seriously, licked the bowl.

I wish I was kidding.

And I was given strict orders to make it again. So, I guess the recipe is good!

But I still can’t tell you the winner yet…. ;)

*I was paid ZERO dollars to endorse this product. Wish they did. Or at least send me lots of coupons to keep using it instead of the Store Brand stuff I usually buy.

Heidi has this amazing blog carnival where she asks you to post recipes, then she randomly picks 3 recipes, asks everyone to try them, and then vote on their favorite.

This, I believe, is her sneaky way of having us get off our butts and cook. And for people like ME who are cuisinely-challenged (yes, it’s a made up word….I do that because I know it bugs Heidi. ;) ), I get a few new recipes out of it. The joke has always been in my family:

(say it with me, Snyders’)

If it doesn’t come out of a box or can, it doesn’t come out of Dana’s kitchen.

Sad, yes. Don’t hate.

So the next recipe I tried (scroll back a couple of posts for the first one) is:

Hire the talents of the Potato Washer again, this time with a red “Sushie” (or SLUSHIE).

And I realize now, after posting all these pictures…I am in SERIOUS need of having another Bridal shower. Bridal showers are wasted on new brides, they don’t cook anyway! They eat out! Bridal showers need to be for the BRIDE who’s been married more than 10-15 YEARS when all our pretty, shiny cooking stuff has all gone to CRAP! Seriously! I’ve been married 17 years, my cooking stuff should just be thrown in the trash! Not even garage sale worthy….just TRASH it all and start new….but who has the money for that? I can’t even finish stripping the wallpaper off my kitchen walls so we can finish painting…nice huh? Heidi has her RAW, this is Dana’s RAW….don’t hate.

Take your frustrations out on DICING those blasted potatoes! You’re supposed to PEEL them, but I don’t roll like that….I just cut ‘em and tell the kids to quit whinin’ and be thankful it’s not Hamburger Helper. ;)

This portion of the recipe, I am copying from sweet Katie’s blog because I didn’t do this part right….I don’t have a Dutch oven. I only know what it is from a recent Pioneer Woman’s post. Sad, huh? I don’t have a crock pot either, you may all weep for me now….

While the potatoes were boiling, I cooked the bacon. And I was insulted that she actually said 4-5 strips of bacon….come on now….don’t play with me….don’t TEASE me with bacon, if it’s in there, it’s ALL in there…

….smell the bacon…embrace the bacon…..LOVE the bacon…..

Boring boiling potatoes….who wants to see that when you can see THIS:

I heart bacon.

By this point, I may have totally screwed up this recipe, but that happens when bacon is involved. I may add bacon to every recipe now….sorry, Heidi, you can fire me if you need to….

After my potatoes are boiled and my bacon is cooked and chopped, I added the seasonings. Yes, I had to adjust my cooking method. Follow Katie’s recipe….not mine…I’m insane with bad cooking utensils…

But the finished product was this:

Yes, in a cheap, plastic bowl….MAN! I just can’t win….but I did have an extra 14 year old over, and Lord knows I’m NOT using my nice glass ones with THEM! And Mike had a friend over working on his truck, and they were both greasy and gross, so no glass for them either…

The soup was good. It was a lot of tastes going on for me, though. I didn’t use the Liquid Smoke, and WalMart was out of cream of potatoes (whoever heard of such a thing anyway?). And I doubled the recipe because I had 8 to feed instead of my normal 5. It doubles well! And I had NONE left over! Not a DROP!

Can’t say anymore (other than the diarrhea of the mouth that I’ve had all post long….sorry….lack of adult stimulation I reckin….) because I’m a judge and I’ll vote later with my pick.

Next to make: POTATO SALAD.

My Mom has just fallen off her chair…..yes, I am MAKING potato salad….apparently you can MAKE it and it doesn’t all come magicly out of plastic containers from the grocery store….crazy world we live in….

Or most of them at least. Hire a trusty assistant for the price of a bowl of ice cream to wash the potatoes:

Ignore the amount of water all over the counters. Pay one of the Potato Washer’s siblings a $1 to mop up the floor…

Dice the potatoes. I hate dicing anything…I’ll just tell you right now…I hate dicing ANYTHING. And peeling…well, peeling is loathed far more than dicing…so nothing was peeled.

I had my trusty Potato Washer add the olive oil:

Then the basil, garlic powder (I didn’t have garlic salt)…..

….umm…it appears, the Potato Washer has gone t0pless…probably all that water from washing potatoes….

and thyme.

I never could understand that whiner from the 70s who always sang about his wish of saving thyme in a bottle….seriously? Honey, check out WalMart…they have it all…

Yes, that was lame, it doesn’t get much better than this though.

After it’s all added, have the Potato Washer stir together. (and put her shirt back on….geez, what kind of establishment IS this??)

And pour over the cursed diced potatoes waiting patiently in the baking dish.

(I really hate dicing…)

Stir it all together to make sure all the potatoes are covered with the mix. They should resemble something like this: (I hope)

Then pop those bad boys in the oven for 30 minutes. Turn the potatoes and drizzle with more olive oil if you’d like (I did, after running to WalMart for more and paying 5 bucks for a tiny bottle of it, I was jolly SURE gonna drizzle more on there. I’m cheap, me thinks. ;) ) and bake for 20-30 more minutes.

Look at how yummy those look in there….I’m salivating I think….WOW, I need to clean my oven! And buy more baking sheets. That’s ATROCIOUS! But I digress…just look at the food…

And paired with some Shake N Bake chicken that was so juicy, and steamed broccoli, cauliflower and carrots….YUMMMM!

In the beginning when I saw they have to cook for a flippin HOUR, I was really REALLY seriously put off by this recipe. I’ll just tell you up front. I do NOT have time for all that mess. But because I promised Heidi I’d do this right, I soldiered on.

And this is what I discovered. The first 30 minutes baking in the oven allowed me to prepare the chicken for baking. By the time I had that all ready to go in, it was time to turn the potatoes, and the chicken had to cook for 20 minutes, so it worked out PERFECTLY! So the cook time was really nothing.

When I do them again because it’s already been asked of me, I think I’ll add some chopped onion. I just REALLY think that would be uber YUMM-O, so I’ll try it.

And because I’m a judge, I cannot tell how the recipe ranks. I will only divulge that it was GOOD and I will make it again.

So easy, a 3 year old can do it!

Next up, Baked Potato soup. Already made it, just need to find the time to blog it…..

Let me preface this with I DON’T LIKE TO COOK. I AM NOT GOOD AT IT. I DO NOT always ENJOY IT!

This being said, and you being duly warned, here is my chicken recipe. And one of the few things I can do without killing people.

Ya take some chicken, I use chicken thighs because our economy sucks and they are cheap. I use the ones with the bones because it makes for better broth. But I also add 2-3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts because I like white meat. I cook them together at the same time because the boned-thighs give the chicken boobs a great flavor.

I guess I should list the ingredients first, shows you how much I cook real food not from a box….

Cook the chicken in a big pot of water until the chicken is DONE and falling off the bone. You can do this in the crockpot while you are at work too. My crockpot, however, is broken because a certain husband, who will remain nameless, dropped it and broke it. Now I don’t have one. Add one or 2 stalks of chopped celery and half an onion (to taste, whatever you like) to the pot and continue cooking. When the chicken is cooked through, take it out and debone it (unless you can afford the boneless chicken, then YAY for you). While you are deboning chicken, add the mixed vegetables and broth. Return the chicken to the pot and add the noodles when the broth comes to a slow boil. Cook til the noodles are done, and eat.

I salt and pepper as the chicken is cooking. You can also add chicken boullion cubes or granules for added flavor if you want. I’ve done it both ways, and I prefer adding the extra flavor. I add maybe 3-4 cubes to a BIG pot.

If you try the recipe and it sucks, sorry. I’m not a good cook. ;)

But, check out Heidi’s blog for people who can actually cook. I’m only doing this so I can learn to cook. ;)